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DoctorWhat posted:Apparently, the post only ever drew the mod's attention due to a report, filed by persons unknown (to me, that is; the admin I contacted quite reasonably didn't volunteer their identity, and I didn't ask), consisting exclusively of the word "autism". Oh, I'm glad they didn't tell you it was me. I'M THE VALEYARD!
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Oct 19, 2014 23:49
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PriorMarcus posted:Oh, I'm glad they didn't tell you it was me. Nah, Valeyard posts over in PSP.
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Oct 19, 2014 23:50
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PriorMarcus posted:Oh, I'm glad they didn't tell you it was me. Valeyard? Oh, please. Maybe a Shipyard. Or a Junkyard. Oh! I've got it! A Milkshake Brings All The Boys To The Yard.
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Oct 19, 2014 23:59
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DoctorWhat posted:Valeyard? Oh, please. Maybe a Shipyard. Or a Junkyard. Reporting again.
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Oct 20, 2014 00:03
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I read your post. It was thought out, logical, and comparing it to the Joker was a very nice touch. But THIS is what you get for being rational in this day and age. Get with the Politically Correct times, man!
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Oct 20, 2014 00:05
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DoctorWhat posted:I wrote a somewhat lengthly but, in my opinion, measured and considered defense of myself I read it, it was a good post
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Oct 20, 2014 00:18
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PriorMarcus posted:Reporting again. So that's your plan? To steal my future reregistrations?!
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Oct 20, 2014 00:18
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DoctorWhat posted:So that's your plan? To steal my future reregistrations?! If I ever find a really good Seventh cosplay, I know my next April Fool's Day prank!
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Oct 20, 2014 00:25
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CaptainCaveman posted:Yeah, I like hearing the Cloister Bell as much as anyone, but it got overused a bit for a while. Talking of sound effects, when Clark asks the Doctor to open the doors to convince Briggsy she's not mad, and he opens them with a switch on the console, did I hear a garbled version of the old "interior doors opening" noise? If so, it was wonderful.
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Oct 20, 2014 00:33
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Good old Clark.
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Oct 20, 2014 00:33
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Cojawfee posted:Good old Clark. It was a bold choice to give the revival's first alien companion so many powers.
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Oct 20, 2014 00:36
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EDIT WHOOPS
DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 03:01 on Oct 20, 2014 |
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Oct 20, 2014 00:37
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Well I guess I'll add to the chorus and say that was a really great episode, and for once the comedy on the show actually landed. Up until a couple of episodes ago this season had ranged from mediocre to rubbish, they need to make sure to get this writer back again.
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Oct 20, 2014 00:49
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 Separated from the Doctor, Clara discovers a new menace from another dimension. But how do you hide when even the walls are no protection? With people to save and the Doctor trapped, Clara goes against an enemy that exists beyond human perception. Peter Capaldi is the Doctor in Flatline. X X X X X Cast Peter Capaldi (The Doctor) Jenna Coleman (Clara Oswald) John Cummins (Roscoe) Jessica Hayles (PC Forrest) Jovian Wade (Rigsy) Christopher Fairbank (Fenton) Written by: Jaimie Mathieson Directed by: Douglas Mackinnon Trailer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9nIXbK_25c Gifs by: J-Ru X X X X X So, how good was this episode?  Flatline sees Clara take center stage, thanks to the Doctor being trapped by an alien force. Add to it an original and creepy group of monsters and a top-notch script, and Flatline just might be, when all is said and done, one of the Twelfth's Doctor “essential” episodes. The TARDIS lands 150 miles away from Clara's home, specifically in Bristol (which was held by Arthur Negus in 1970. Not confirmed, just a bit of gossip). It's not the first time that the Doctor has landed somewhere other than where he intended, but this time it's not his fault. Rather, some unknown force is draining dimensional energy from the TARDIS, causing its exterior to shrink. With the Doctor trapped inside, Clara is forced to take on his role. Sonic screwdriver and psychic paper in hand, Clara explores the council estate, where a rash of disappearances hasn't gathered the interest of the local police. However, a nearby pedestrian tunnel has some new graffiti; murals of the departed... After last week's solid Mummy on the Orient Express, writer Jamie Mathieson takes us to a sparse council estate on the edge of Bristol. It's a setting Matheson knows well, as he penned several episodes of the BBC series Almost Human which took place in the same location. The location works to the story's benefit; a rundown council estate, a rusting industrial area, and a series of abandoned subway tunnels help to establish a very nice variant of the “base under siege” setting. No one is coming to help (least of all the disinterested police), putting the characters on their own against the threat of the two-dimensional creatures known as the Boneless. And how about those Boneless? A brand new threat from another plane of existence, the viewer doesn't know if the Boneless are explorers, lost travelers, conquering invaders, or just hostile 2-D psychopaths. Experienced Who director Douglas Mackinnon (The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky, The Power of Three, Cold War) does a standout job with the presentation of the Boneless. At first, they slither across the walls and the floor towards their prey, in one case sucking a policewoman into the carpet and leaving a layout of her nervous system on the wall as a tree-like mural. As they study and dissect their victims, they slowly become three-dimensional, moving in a blurry, jerky manner as they stalk their prey. The design of the three-dimensional Boneless is unnerving, like watching a old VHS cassette held together by Scotch tape, the video image jerking and skipping with every passing moment. It could have been easy for Mackinnon to keep them in the shadows, but instead he keeps them on screen just enough for the viewer to be unnerved. The Boneless are definitely a “jump behind the couch” creature that will both scare and delight young viewers of the show.  Inside the TARDIS, the Doctor is in scientist mode, but he has to fully rely on Clara to be his eyes and ears and provide the necessary data. Mathieson and Mackinnon together do a fantastic job of demonstrating just how helpless the Doctor is, as the lights slowly begin to fade, life support fails, and the Doctor has little control over his fate. Perhaps the best compliment I can give the writer and director comes when a subway train is about to barrel into the TARDIS. After an abundance of overuse in recent years, the one singular chime of the Cloister Bell made me sit up and proclaim “oh, no!” It's been a very long time since a Doctor Who serial  The tension of the story is well balanced by the comedic aspects, including a literal use of the concept of “hammerspace!” The second half of Flatline is very much a nail-biter, but the creepiness of the first half is mixed in with some very funny moments. The episode takes the idea of the Doctor trapped in a tiny TARDIS and milks it for all its worth. Capaldi's face peering out from the small doors, one hand reaching out to give Clara the sonic screwdriver and psychic paper, and even the tribute to The Addams Family as the Doctor's hand “Things” his way across a set of train tracks to safety. But we can't forget the one-liners as Clara tells people to call her “The Doctor” as Twelve growls “don't you dare.” It's refreshing, just for one episode, for the Doctor to see how he actually is with people, and how Clara channels him for both comedic and, later on, dramatic effect.  Flatline revolves around the Boneless, Clara, and the Doctor. Which is for the best, as the supporting cast of characters will be remembered more for what they said or what they did rather than their personalities. We have the policewoman who thought Clara was from MI-5, the train driver who “always wanted to ram something,” two community service blokes who served as redshirts, and the grafitti artist who took way to long to realize “oh, yeah, I DON'T need to throw my life away by crashing this train.” The only standout was the real villain of the story; Christopher Fairbank as Fenton, the head of the community service team. He's the standard “this will never work” jerk that every story requires, but Fairbank takes it a step further by establishing his ideas of class and social structure without really outright stating it. Fenton is the kind of character who, in past serials, should have died along the way. Instead, sometimes good things happen to bad people, as Fenton dismisses those who died with a statement of “sometimes you burn the brush to save the forest. So, thank you for saving my life.” It's a shock to see such a character not get his comeuppance...but it adds to the uniqueness of this episode. I just hope it's a one time thing... The Doctor takes a backseat in this episode, trapped inside the “shrinking, but not shrinking” TARDIS. Even when confined to his control room, Capaldi's Doctor is still in motion, running up and down steps, throwing on a pair of steampunk jeweler's goggles, and constantly providing information and commentary to Clara throughout. Moreso than last week's Mummy on the Orient Express, this is the Doctor in scientist mode, trying to solve the puzzle with both his life and the lives of countless others at stake. It's a fine performance, even if the Doctor never quite comes out and says how he can send the Boneless back to their 2-D universe. But when he does so, Capaldi knocks it out of the park with a speech akin to Matt Smith's “hello, I'm the Doctor” speech from The Eleventh Hour. If there was any doubt in anyone's mind that this new actor WAS indeed the Doctor, the dialogue below should erase any and all doubt.  quote:"I tried to talk, I want you to remember that. I tried to reach out, I tried to understand you, but I think that you understand us perfectly. And I think that you just don't care! And I don't know whether you are here to invade, infiltrate or just replace us. I don't suppose it really matters now, you are monsters! That is the role you seem determined to play, so it seems that I must play mine! The man that stops the monsters! I'm sending you back to your own dimension. Who knows? Some of you may even survive the trip, and if you do, remember this: you are not welcome here! This plane is protected! I am the Doctor!  One quibble about Clara in this episode. When she's hanging from a chair in the middle of a room, flat tentacles slithering towards her and the graffiti artist...why oh why would she pick right then and there to answer a phone call from Danny?!? It was the only piece of bad writing in all of Flatline, as Jenna Coleman IS the Doctor. She shuts down the voices of the idiotic, she makes educated guesses, she barely escapes danger, she inspires the hopeless to hope, and she uses a bit of brilliance to save the day and restore the TARDIS to its full size. Jenna Coleman takes the acting ball and runs with it. With only the barest of hesitation when the Doctor is in her ear, and the boldness of action when she decides to not do what the Doctor would do, but to do what SHE would do, Clara does everything possible to not only save the day, but to earn the Doctor's approval. Her actions during these events were nothing less than “Doctor-esque,” but at the end, after the Doctor has realized she's been lying to him about Danny not having concerns about her traveling in the TARDIS, calls her out on it. “You were an exceptional Doctor. Goodness had nothing to do with it.” One of the themes of this season has been “is the Doctor a good person?” He himself asked that question in the season opener, Deep Breath, and subsequent episodes have focused, directly or indirectly, on this topic. Flatline brings it to the forefront, but does so via a bit of role reversal. Now, it's Clara who does what needs to be done, putting people in harm's way via “calculated risk,” an educated guess that her plan would cause the TARDIS to be restored. It's exactly what the Doctor does on a regular basis, but rarely does he take the joy in it that Clara did when she was in his shoes for once. Just because the Doctor does exceptional things...does it make him a good man> One other thing...the ending shot with Missy and the high-end, future-technology that is an iPad, as she says that with regards to Clara, “she chose well.” I know it's a little late in the game with regards to Clara, but after nearly every companion in the revival outside of Martha being “special” in someway, I'd like to see the Doctor just have an “old school, straight up, traveling with the Doctor for the thrill and leaving when they feel like their time is done” companion. We don't always need “Bad Wolf” or “The Impossible Girl.” Sometimes, all the show needs is “The Shadow Cabinet Minister of Blowing Stuff up with Nitro-9.” Flatline is everything a good episode of Doctor Who should be. It's creepy, it's funny, it showcases the Doctor, the companion, and the dynamic between them, and does things JUST a little differently from the norm. As it's a stand-alone episode, I feel that this story could become the Twelfth Doctor's answer to Blink – an episode that someone could show to a new viewer of the show and say “this is everything that's awesome about Doctor Who.”  Next up - Everywhere, in every land, a forest has grown overnight and taken back the Earth... Peter Capaldi is the Doctor in...In the Forest of the Night.
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Oct 20, 2014 01:58
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Great review J. I have to disagree on the fuckwad's survival though - as I commented after the last episode I like it when there are non-essential loose ends left loose at the end of an episode of Who. Barely getting away with saving the universe should leave a loose end here and there. Out of interest, how were the Bristol accents for the non-UK viewers?
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Oct 20, 2014 02:23
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One Swell Foop posted:Great review J.
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Oct 20, 2014 02:31
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DoctorWhat posted:I'm afraid I'm already quite well-acquainted with the singularly best Seven cosplay you'll ever see. I'll see if I can procure some evidence. I'm suddenly completely ashamed of the 7 get-up I'm trying to finish. 
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Oct 20, 2014 02:41
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One Swell Foop posted:Great review J. I have to disagree on the fuckwad's survival though - as I commented after the last episode I like it when there are non-essential loose ends left loose at the end of an episode of Who. Barely getting away with saving the universe should leave a loose end here and there. Yeah, it was fine and him getting his "comeuppance" would have been wrong in my opinion. Once you (meaning Clara or the Doctor) start down the path of deciding who deserves to survive and who doesn't, they're on the road to becoming villains. Their job isn't to save the "deserving", it's to try and save everybody. Some people will die, true, and the "wrong" people might live, but that's just the way it goes. The important thing is that you TRY to save people.
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Oct 20, 2014 02:42
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Big Mean Jerk posted:I'm suddenly completely ashamed of the 7 get-up I'm trying to finish. Nah man, you're good. Seven's hat never had a big light up globe on top of it so there's still room to improve.
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Oct 20, 2014 02:43
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DoctorWhat posted:I'm afraid I'm already quite well-acquainted with the singularly best Seven cosplay you'll ever see. I'll see if I can procure some evidence. That guy looks like a smug self satisfied jackoff and I want to punch his lights out. What I'm saying is that he did a very good job on his costume.
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Oct 20, 2014 02:44
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He hosed up that costume pretty badly, it's got question marks all over it. Way to misunderstand the character!
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Oct 20, 2014 02:52
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Jsor posted:That guy looks like a smug self satisfied jackoff and I want to punch his lights out. He's an NY local, so we've established a bit of an in-character double-act for conventions and events that largely consists of me indignantly objecting to his machinations while he taps his umbrella to the floor impatiently. He's about a head-and-a-bit shorter than me, too, which makes it even better because I have to really contort to make eye contact , especially around the brim of his hat, so the "blocking" is really easy to maintain even while navigating crowded convention halls. 
DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Oct 20, 2014 |
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Oct 20, 2014 02:54
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DoctorWhat posted:He's an NY local, so we've established a bit of an in-character double-act for conventions and events that largely consists of me indignantly objecting to his machinations while he taps his umbrella to the floor impatiently. Autism Edit: Quote is not report Cojawfee fucked around with this message at 03:26 on Oct 20, 2014 |
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Oct 20, 2014 03:00
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You're bonkers.
PriorMarcus fucked around with this message at 03:10 on Oct 20, 2014 |
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Oct 20, 2014 03:07
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Somethign I noticed this episode is that Capaldi has this really wierd way of moving when going anything above walking - I don't know if it is intentional or just the way that Capaldi naturally moves. I think it looks great.
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Oct 20, 2014 03:24
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Mr Beens posted:Somethign I noticed this episode is that Capaldi has this really wierd way of moving when going anything above walking - I don't know if it is intentional or just the way that Capaldi naturally moves. I think it looks great. He leads with his wrists. 
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Oct 20, 2014 03:25
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Please watch The Thick of It to see the joy and wonder that is Malcolm Tucker running anywhere  Also please just watch The Thick of It for the joy and wonder that is The Thick of It
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Oct 20, 2014 03:27
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Jerusalem posted:Yeah, it was fine and him getting his "comeuppance" would have been wrong in my opinion. Once you (meaning Clara or the Doctor) start down the path of deciding who deserves to survive and who doesn't, they're on the road to becoming villains. Their job isn't to save the "deserving", it's to try and save everybody. Some people will die, true, and the "wrong" people might live, but that's just the way it goes. The important thing is that you TRY to save people. It was just a shock to me. Usually characters like that don't walk away unscathed. It was different and a nice twist on the standard "everything in a bow" stock ending.
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Oct 20, 2014 03:30
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CobiWann posted:It was just a shock to me. Usually characters like that don't walk away unscathed. It was different and a nice twist on the standard "everything in a bow" stock ending. There was that rear end in a top hat in Voyage of the Damned who survived, wasn't there? Or have I got things confused?
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Oct 20, 2014 03:32
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I was mildly disappointed that Peter Capaldi didn't do the Addams Family "Snap-snap" after getting the TARDIS off the tracks  .
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Oct 20, 2014 03:36
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DoctorWhat posted:There was that rear end in a top hat in Voyage of the Damned who survived, wasn't there? Or have I got things confused? No that's right, but most people forget that episode as part of their brain's defense mechanisms.
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Oct 20, 2014 03:42
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Jerusalem posted:No that's right, but most people forget that episode as part of their brain's defense mechanisms. Does this mean I have to rewatch Voyage of the Damned now? 
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Oct 20, 2014 03:43
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CobiWann posted:Does this mean I have to rewatch Voyage of the Damned now? Yes, and Daleks in Manhattan, and the farting alien two parter, and all of Torchwood.
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Oct 20, 2014 03:50
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CobiWann posted:Does this mean I have to rewatch Voyage of the Damned now? For all you know you just did, and your mind has already helpfully erased that information. Don't get caught in a loop!
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Oct 20, 2014 03:52
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RodShaft posted:and all of Torchwood. Series 8 takes place during the plot of Miracle Day so nobody can die anymore. Missy is just disappearing the people that should die under normal rules. This is canon.
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Oct 20, 2014 03:53
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Jerusalem posted:For all you know you just did, and your mind has already helpfully erased that information. Don't get caught in a loop! That's just silly. Now, if you don't mind, I have a game of poker to go play with Dr. Grace Holloway, Leela, and Kamelion.
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Oct 20, 2014 03:57
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Jsor posted:Series 8 takes place during the plot of Miracle Day so nobody can die anymore. Missy is just disappearing the people that should die under normal rules. This is canon. I plan on blaming Torchwood if the Missy arc is crappy anyway(like I do whenever there is a crappy arc), so this would save me a few shoddy mind jumps.
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Oct 20, 2014 04:01
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CobiWann posted:That's just silly. Why are your arms full of black lines? It's not the silence, but your viewings of Voyage of the Damned!
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Oct 20, 2014 04:09
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RodShaft posted:Yes, and Daleks in Manhattan, and the farting alien two parter, and all of Torchwood. And Kill the Moon, which I had forgotten existed until just a few moments ago. The last two episodes have driven it from my memory.
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Oct 20, 2014 04:17
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Jsor posted:Series 8 takes place during the plot of Miracle Day so nobody can die anymore. Missy is just disappearing the people that should die under normal rules. This is canon. The Doctor refused to help humanity during that crisis. He landed the TARDIS, opened the door, then closed it and left without saying a word. Like with every other stupid thing Torchwood deals with. THIS IS CANON. Children of Earth is okay, in accordance with the "RTD can write exactly one good series of anything he makes" rule
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Oct 20, 2014 04:23
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